Lexical tone perception in infants and young children : empirical studies and theoretical perspectives

Traditional theories of language development and speech processing have been derived from psycholinguistic research that has primarily focused on a particular subset of language types. Specifically, Romance and Germanic languages (e.g., English, French, German) have, until recently, received more attention than other types of languages, such as Chinese languages. This has led to selective emphasis on consonants and vowels"”the phonological building blocks of European languages"”in theories of language, to the exclusion of other phonological building blocks, such lexical tone. Like consonants and vowels, variations in tones determine lexical meaning, but unlike consonants and vowels, lexical tones are based on pitch variations. Lexical tone is pervasive; it is used in at least half of the world's languages (Maddieson, 2013), including most Asian and some African, Central American, and European languages. This Research Topic brings together a collection of recent empirical research on the processing and representation of lexical tones across the lifespan with an emphasis on advancing knowledge on how tone systems are acquired and enriching current theories of language processing and development. The articles focus on various aspects of tones: its early perception, influences on word learning, the acquisition of new tone systems, and tone production.